HFCS may make us fatter faster

Not all calories are created equal

By Kim Carlson

July 29, 2008

Even before we watched Curt Ellis and Ian Cheney trying to make high-fructose corn syrup in their kitchen, which they did, hilariously, in "King Corn," we were skeptical about the stuff. Michael Pollan lambasts it in The Omnivore’s Dilemma, and others, like nutrition expert Marion Nestle, are wary of it (although to be fair, Nestle is wary of high quantities of HFCS — and of too much sugar, too).

Last week, Tara Parker-Pope, of the New York Times’ health blog, Well, reported on a small (read: micro) study in the most recent Journal of Nutrition that shows fructose can make you fatter than a similar amount of glucose. Apparently the study shows that fructose isn’t synthesized in the body the same way glucose is managed; instead, it speeds through the process of metabolization, and becomes fat quicker.

The dozens of comments that follow the blog post enhance the confusion, but we thought this one, from a reader called “z,” seemed sensible:

Sorry . . . but this is just another indication that the idea that any calorie is metabolized just like any other calorie is simply WRONG. Our metabolisms are a lot more complicated than that.

For more on the body’s metabolism, read “Sweet and lowdown.”